Methodological notes

Each part of a person biographical record has a separate editing section. To edit a section, click the little pen image

• Some fields have drop down boxes
• Other fields have a series of boxes - one for each type of information
  • Fill-in whatever boxes you have information for. You can always go back to add more information
  • As you fill-in some boxes, you will see little hits to the right of the box
  • As you fill-in boxes with names of people or organisations, you will see any similar names that are already in the database appear below the box.
  • If you select one of these name, a pop-up will give you a chance to double check that it is the right name
  • After completing all your changes for each section, you can select 'save' or, if you are not happy with changes, 'cancel' to keep the data as is

• Correcting errors

  • If the error can be corrected by typing over with the correct info, just hit 'save' when you are done
  • If the error is quite serious, just hit the relevant 'delete or change' button and enter the correct information
  • If the error is a duplicate name, add a note in the comment box on the right of the screen
    • Two or more records for the same person can happen when there is one reference to a name in, say, a census record and another reference to the same name in a newspaper article and there is not secure why to know that it is the very same person.

• Unusual Convention for Last Names

  • An individual's last name is either that person's current name or the name the person had at the end of his/her life
  • An individual's spouse/partner is either that person's current spouse/partner or the spouse/partner of the person at the end of her/his life
    
    • Earlier spouses or partners are listed with other family members
    • Divorced spouses or partners are also listed with other family members using the notes field to record the divorce and date of divorce.
    • Deceased spouses or partners are also listed either as the latest spouse or with other family members, as preferred .

• Person Data : Core Biographic Information

  
  
  • Name Related Information
  • First name
    • middle names, and middle initials can be included in the first name field (e.g. Mary Ellen )
    • variants of names are included in the first name field separated by the mostly likely normal first name by a backslash (.e.g. Rochel / Rose )
    • well known nicknames can be included in the first name field separated by from the normal first name by quotation marks(.e.g. Henry "Hank" )
    • If a woman's name is "Mrs [husband's name], enter the [husband's name] followed by (Mrs). (eg. Maurice (Mrs); this permits better name indexing "
    • If the first name is not known
      • create a temporary first name that reflects what is known and enclose it in square brackets (e.g [MotherOfSamAndSarah])
      • if this is not possible, create a temporary first name of FirstNameNotKnown and enclose it in square bracets (e.g. [FirstNameNotKnown])
    • when there a duplicate record is identified , the first name field is modified to contain the first name followed by in paranthesis "now" and the correct personid number (e.g (now 999999) )
    
    
  • Last name
    • alternative spelling of a family name can be recorded
      • in the Last Name field with a backslash ('/') between the spellings OR
      • can be recorded in the Other Family Names field
    • If the last name is not known
      • create a temporary last name that reflects what is known and enclose it in square brackets (e.g for someone who might be called Cohen [Cohen])
      • if this is not possible, create a temporary last name of LastNameNotKnown and enclose it in square bracets (e.g. [LastNameNotKnown])
    
    
  • Name titles - formal titles (e.g. Rabbi or Dr) (no punctuation);
    • "Mrs" (no punctuation) should be used only where the name of husband is not known (e.g. "Mrs" is only a marker for a marriage)
    • "Miss" (no punctuation) should be used only to signify that at the time of listing there is no knowledge of a marriage (e.g. "Miss" is only a marker that no marriage has occurred )
    
    
  • Source - (Name) Initial source(s) of the name : used to indicate the likely precision and accuracy of the data
    
    
  • Other family names - Birth names or earlier Old World names should be recorded in the Other family names field
    
    
  • Hebrew Name - transliterated version of the Hebrew name
    
    
    

  • Birth-Related Information

    • Birth dates and location - Hebrew birth dates should be recorded in the notes field. Birth location should use, if possible, current geographical names, particularly for East European places
      
      
    • Sources - birth - All sources used for birth dates and place. When information is added to the file, DOMJ adds on-line names as the source of the new material.
      
    
    

  • Parents and Spouse-Related Information

    • Mother's and Father's names - Multiple entries (adoption, re-marriage) should be recorded in the notes field.
      
      
    • Spouse's name and date of marriage - Multiple entries (adoption, re-marriage) should be recorded in the notes field. "Never Married" is a valid entry
      
    
    
    

  • Death-Related Information

    • Date of Death - English date of death, spelling out the month. Information provided by cemetery documents often records the date of internment ,which is generally one or two days after actual death date. If the data of death is not available, the display shows date of internment.
      
      
    • Date and Place of Death - English date of death, spelling out the month. Information provided by cemetery documents often records the date of internment ,which is generally one or two days after actual death date. If the data of death is not available, the display shows date of internment.
      
      
    • Hebrew Date of Death - Hebrew date of death in translation
      
      
    • Sources - death information - All sources used for date dates and place. When information is added to the file, DOMJ adds on-line names as the source of the new material.
      
    
    
    

  • Place-Related Information

    Reg1, reg2, and reg3 fields Each person can be assigned to three geographic regions
    
    • Region codes within Maine
    • Region codes for pre-immigration areas : the old country (TOC)
      • codes start with 'TOC' followed by a dash '-' and the name of the immigrant area
      • if immigrant area is not known, use 'TOC' alone
      • it is preferable to use current names for immigrant areas, not the name at the time of immigration
    • Region codes for areas outside of Maine in North America : from-away places (FW)
      • codes start with 'FW' followed by a dash '-' and the two letter postal code for the state or the Canadian province
    
    
    

  • Supplemental Information

    Notes field - Inconsistencies in the data from different sources have been preserved in the notes field. Please add to the notes field any references or on-line links to other family histories.
    
  
  

• Person Data : Relationship Table

  Relationship Table records the normal way one would describe the relationship between the named person and the second person (e.g. "daughter of", "mother of', "wife of"), the relationship between the named person and an organization (e.g. occupation, community service) OR between a named person and a crucial fact in their lives (e.g. 'lived in [city]', 'immigrated in [year] from [place]')

  
  
  Family Relationships (except for parents and spouse) - The relationship recorded should be the normal way one would describe the relationship between the named person and the second person (e.g. "daughter of", "mother of', "wife of"). This removes the ambiguity introduced when someone records simply "mother" followed by a female name.
  
  Lived in Maine - If a person doesn't have a Maine reference in the birth or death location, it would be important to indicate their principle place or places of residence (are they "Mainers" or not? ) . Even if the person does have a Maine connection in the birth place or death location fields, it would be helpful to record their principal place or places of residence in Maine.
  
  Occupation and History - the person's occupation(s) or relevant historical information (e.g. "immigrated from", "got MD at")
  
  Community Service - the name of the organization, the role of the person in this organization (e.g. "early member", "vice-president", "machor" ), the time period (e.g. years or decades) and a comment.
  
  

• Person Data : Cemetery Table

  Cemetery Information - Place of burial and plot location is generally provided by the cemetery associations or the official death records from the City of Portland. For burials in the small Smith St cemetery, there are no plot numbers. For burials in Beth EI Memorial Park, Mt. Carmel, and Mt. Sinai, the plot numbers were taken from the relevant maps or records.
  
  Cemetery Notes - Information from the headstone or about the location of the headstone.
  
  

• Organisational Data : Core Table

  Name of Organisation - full formal name of organisation
  Short name of organisation - name(s) as commonly used in the area for the organisation
  
  

• Organisational Data : Relationship Table

  The relationship table records the 'family tree' information for the organisation (what organisations it is connected with, what were its predecessor organisations, etc) and what is its organisational history (e.g. operated from [location] in [years]). Information on founding and ending dates are in the core organisational table.

  
  

• References : Master Reference Table

  Although you may not see all the sources, there are references for all the material presented. When information is added on-line , DOMJ adds the name of the registered users as the source of the new material.
  

  
  full name of source - full source reference in standardized footnote format
  short name of source
  • name used in all reference and source fields for convenience
  • it is also the name used in conjunction with 'Relationship table : source2' to determine a link to a document, photograph, or oral recollection
  
  location - physical location of the original hardcopy document or photograph
  Researcher(s) - names of person(s) who have contributed the data
  SCode and SCodeNew type of document (e.g. census, photograph) and code for type of document; used principally to organize the display of the data
  status of work indicates whether source has been reviewed, is partly reviewed or is still pending review
  url link used to provide url link to external or internal resource
  • internal references are principally to the directories 'pj/images' or 'pj/docs'